Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Wii to launch November 12th for $249?

Another alleged insider has come forward and given us the apparent launch date and price of the Wii console. This time, the rumourmonger comes courtesy of the good people at Infendo:

It's me, everyone's favorite 'unofficial' Nintendo Rep with some BIG Wii news that everyone has been waiting for. That's right, the release date: It will be November 12. (...)

Wii's price hasn't yet been finalized. The higher ups don't yet know whether or not to bundle the nunchaku with it. What they do know is that if it's not bundled, it will be $229 and bundled price will be $249. Also Goldeneye and Perfect Dark may be on the Virtual Console eventually. The Donkey Kong Country games, Donkey Kong 64, and Diddy Kong Racing will be on there for sure. Higher ups are still working on getting Goldeneye and Perfect Dark added into the deal.

The launch date is either a safe guess or an indicator of a real insider. I still strongly believe that Wii will launch between November 10th and 16th. That rumour was the only plausible one (and, moreover, one where I could verify the source). This is also in keeping with Iwata´s comments from my E3 interview with him: They do not want to rush the console, but assemble the perfect software line-up first.

Now, there are a few things that don´t add up, though. When visiting Ubisoft Paris in early April and seeing Red Steel, they told us that the nunchuk attachment was required. There are many other titles requiring the attachment, like Metroid Prime 3 and Zelda. That´s why I believe this one is fake, after all.

I also strongly believe that the price is too high. Though Nintendo might aim higher, I think that $199 is the maximum asking price if they want to win over a mass market. Because us gamers might have no quarms paying more than $200 for a console without any games included. But that is exactly where our parents (whose perspective we should be considering here) just shake their heads in disbelief. My recommendation to Nintendo is to sell the console for less than $200 and include Wii: Sports and Wii: Music. Any more expensive and the mass market might continue playing Minesweeper and Solitair.Source: Infendo

22 comments:

ColdBlooder
said...

249$ would mean 249€... wow, that price would be a shocker. thats only 50$ or € less that the core xb0x 360. there is no doubt that 249 is to much. and not inclusing the nunchuck attachment?`how dumb would that be? this thing is used in the most games already, so it really would be a mistake to leave that one out of the box... i sincerely hope that THIS is fake...

Sell it for less than 200$?You can not be serious!As long as we don't know how high the production costs are and what the value of the hardware components is, it remains impossible to make a definite assumption Falafelkid!

Also,keep in mind that it could have the same effect as GameCube namely in that sense that people take it for a toy or something despite the more stylish design if they sell it for under 200$!I think 250$ is a very attractive price it makes you think that you get sufficient hardware packed in and not only a "gimmicky" controller.250$ makes you new contoller + a little bump-mapping,specular lightning,some shading etc. you know a little bit of everything.It makes you feel they didnt neccessarly sacrifice on the graphics side of things.250$ makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

My personal opinion is that $250 is a fair price for the Wii. Nintendo as always released their consoles at a profit and a motion sensing controller and sensor bar along with 512 MB of flash memory and possible retro controller don’t come as cheap as many people think. Besides the $250 price point would give Nintendo some room for future price drops in the coming years, if it is released at the minimum price from the beginning it will not give them much marketing room and may come of as cheap. Plus I also have a feeling that there will be a pre-installed title on the flash memory (such as Wii Sports).

As for the article more then likely fake, but November 12th is a safe bet.

The one thing that makes me think this is fake, a $20 price difference just fot getting the nunchuck attachement?I mean come on, regular additional controllers sell for around $30 (first party), now an extra $20 for HALF a controller packed in seems awfully stupid, specially considering how Nintendo's been saying that one of the good things about the add-ons that could be connected to the Wiimote is that since most of the processing is done by the Wiimote the "cases" and add-ons would be cheap, and I don´t know you, but $20 for an analog stick and 2 buttons ain't cheap in my book.Just my point of view

I just want to point out that you do a great justice to the art of the english language in your posts Falafel. Your english is far better than most Americans, and certainly better than about 95% of the english that's published on the Internet at any given moment. Vielen Dank!

anonymous grammar guy... why the hell did you repost that under this article? we already saw it and responded to it. /sigh

back on topic ;) 249: i'll have to agree that this "insider" is yet again another punkass fake. i've been saying $199 when i'd hype wii to all my friends and family since the beginning, and i know falafelkid has a strong stance on that price too... it's simple: anything over $200 is just not mass-market *enough*, i fear. i really hope nintendo knows this... are you listening to me Reggie? it's me! "superfan"! $199 reggie- it's just smart.

nunchaku: inclusion is obvious.

november 12: uh... *shrug*

i guess if they didn't try to go after the mass market immediately... they might assume that only fanboys will buy out the stock at launch. DS took a while to really catch on with the mass market... maybe they think they can launch at $249 and price-drop at the end of the fiscal year or something. hmmm... nah. they're gonna want to take full advantage of the holiday season this year... *especially* since sony's all slippin'. i hope they push the ps3 back again :) maybe nintendo's been calling sony's bluff all along, and somehow *knows* that sony is going to push back the ps3 again... and they're waiting to announce any launch info until they get official confirmation... *shrug* who knows.

While we're at this language grinding, Falafelkid: apostrophe should be used instead of acute accent when indicating omitted letters.

Thanks for the information, I never knew that. I briefly read up on it and the reason why a lot of continental Europeans (including myself) get this wrong is because of the keyboard layout, see here.

Hi pgtl_10.

Yup, Pete replied already. Here´s his answer:

Not sure what interview you're referring to that I supposedly did about Oblivion at the Wii. I don't think anyone has ever asked me if we're bringing Oblivion to the Wii. In any case, I certainly haven't told anyone we plan to port it to Wii. If someone is saying otherwise, they're mistaken.

I hope that helps.

I also asked Pete whether Oblivion for Wii was being ruled out or whether they simply were not making an announcement yet. Let´s see what he says. But the interview must be fake.

I looked at it in more detail and we could start another grammatical examination right here:

Hines promises "a never before seeing experience" and he is said to be ´over helmed´.

Also, "the Wii do not have the power." My word, I should have looked at this more closely. I feel bad about even bothering Pete Hines with this.

A set price for the Wii in the UK to match a US price of 200$ would be £130, which would be crazy!! (the DS Lite is £100 and the Wii is far superior)

Yes, I think you´re totally right. My guess for a UK price would be around £150, no less. Traditionally, consoles have been cheapest in Japan and most expensive in Europe. And the UK has usually had to live with higher price tags than the Euro region.